| Description | The collection consists of various items relating to the running of the original premises at Albyn Place, as well as at Ferryhill. There are also items relating to Mary Elmslie's father, James Calder (see AET/AFOA/9).
AET/AFOA/1 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum Minute Books, 1840 - 1889
AET/AFOA/2 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum/AET Girls' Home Financial Records, 1836 - 1956
AET/AFOA/3 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum /AET Girls' Home: Trust Deeds, 1842 - 1910
AET/AFOA/4 AET Girls' Home Registers of Girls and Foundationers and lists of applicants, 1891 - 1956
AET/AFOA/5 AET Girls' Home Matron/Superintendent reports, 1909 - 1956
AET/AFOA/6 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum /AET Girls' Home Medical Records, 1881 - 1956
AET/AFOA/7 AET Girls' Home Visitor Books, 1894 - 1954
AET/AFOA/8 AET Girls' Home: Property Records, 1909 - 1956
AET/AFOA/9 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum: Papers relating to Founder and Foundation, 1792 - 1935
AET/AFOA/10 Administrative records of Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum /AET Girls' Home, 1880 - 1956
AET/AFOA/11 AET Girls' Home: Whitehall Fund (Aberdeen Female School of Industry), 1926 - 1930
AET/AFOA/12 AET School of Domestic Economy: Course Syllabuses, 1907 - 1910
AET/AFOA/13 AET Girls Home: Papers relating to individual foundationers, 1883 - 1955
AET/AFOA/14 Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum: Secretary's Correspondence, 1851 - 1854
Please note that access to some material may be restricted under the Data Protection Act (1998). |
| Administrative History | The Aberdeen Female Orphan Asylum was founded by Mary Elmslie (1780 - 1868) in 1839. Mary was the widow of James Elmslie of Woodcote Place, near Epsom, Surrey, and the daughter of James Calder, wine merchant in Aberdeen (1745 - 1832) and his wife Anne Stephen (d. 1829). She endowed the Asylum with £35,820 of 3% Government annuities.
The Female Orphan Asylum was originally set up on lands Mary purchased in Oldmachar, in Albyn Place (the expanded building is now Harlaw Academy). The entry requirements were strict: a candidate had to be no younger than four and no older than eight on admittance, and left at 16; her parents had to have been married, and had to have lived for at least three years in one of the parishes of St. Nicholas, Oldmachar, Nigg, or Banchory Devenick. The Asylum took in around 50 girls at a time and was also known as the Aberdeen Female Orphan Institute.
In 1888 the Female Orphan Asylum was amalgamated into the Aberdeen Educational Trust and, under the terms of the Trust's Scheme of Administration, the Female Orphan Asylum was closed to new admissions. The Scheme of Administration replaced the Asylum with a Girls' Home and School of Domestic Economy at 352 King Street (the site of the Boys' and Girls' Hospital, see AET/BGH), to teach 60 foundationers and maintain up to 30 girls. The Albyn Place building was sold to the Aberdeen School Board in 1891 and is now (in 2017) part of Harlaw Academy. The girls were transferred to the Educational Trust's new Girls' Home, with younger girls sent with the Asylum's matron to a house near Ashley School. Former residents of the Hospital for Orphan and Destitute Female Children were also transferred to the Girls' Home or boarded out.
The School of Domestic Economy, or the 'Do-School', as it generally became known to Aberdonians, and the King Street property were transferred to Robert Gordon's Technical College under the terms of the 1909 Robert Gordon's Technical College and Aberdeen Endowments Trust Order. The Aberdeen School of Domestic Science remained at King Street until it officially opened its new doors at Kepplestone on 24 September, 1963.
The Girls' Home moved to Sunnybank House, Sunnybank Road in 1910. Ferryhill Lodge, 9 Polmuir Road, was purchased in late 1937, and the Girls' Home moved there on 24 May 1938.
The 1934 Aberdeen Educational Endowments Scheme states that the Trust can maintain and cloth not more than 60 girls, known as Endowment Foundationers. "The girls admitted to the foundation shall be poor orphans and poor girls whose parents are in such financial circumstances as to require aid in maintain and educating them". Places were to be allotted to girls whose parent(s) are or were inhabitants of certain areas in the following proportions: half to City of Aberdeen and County of Aberdeenshire; 3/10ths to Parish of St Nicholas; 1/10th Parish of Old Machar; 1/20th Parish of Nigg; 1/20th parish of Banchory-Devenick. The foundations were either given a sum to cover their maintenance and clothing, or a place in the Girls' Home where they would be clothed and maintained.
The Trust took the decision in October 1955 that, due to dwindling numbers, it could not justify keeping on the building; on 16 February 1956 it confirmed the premises would close at the end of the following month. The building was sold in May 1956.
Most of the girls in the early 20th century went into service, either at home or abroad, sometimes with very good families (the Countess of Westmoreland took several). Later in the century, many went into nursing or shopwork.
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